Cairo: At least 10 soldiers have been killed and several others wounded after a car bomb exploded in Egypt’s North Sinai town El-Arish on Wednesday. The blast was set off by the suicide bomber while two minibuses carrying infantry soldiers were passing by the explosives laden vehicle.

So far no group has claimed the responsibility of carrying out the Wednesday’s bombings. Since Egypt president Mohamed Morsi was oust in July, Islamist militants have become more active in the Sinai and stepped up their attacks on Egyptian soldiers.

The Islamist militants saw the ousts of Morsi in a military coup as an attack on Islam and targetted the soldiers since then. When Morsi became the first democratically elected president of the counrty, Islamist factions came into power.
In September, the military launched a major operation against Islamist militants in Sinai and began cracking down on them.
After president Hosni Mubarak was toppled in the Egyptian uprising in 2011, the Islamists resurged which were repressed by Mubarak’s military for decades.